What Cost The Eagles 2016?

Looking at it all right now, the one thing I can say cost the Eagles the season come down to a few bad playing or coaching decisions. Some pivotal calls have cost the Eagles multiple games this season and a chance at a postseason berth.

The first call goes all the way back to the loss against the Lions. On the day I turned 23, I was stuck watching the Eagles drop a 1 point loss to Detroit in the 313. The call that cost the Birds the ballgame was the deep ball thrown by Carson Wentz. The Eagles had plenty of time to run 2-3 plays of 20-plus yards but failed to do so. Instead they dialed up a deep ball that was overthrown and was intercepted. That was just the first notch in the L-belt for the Birds this season.

The next big one comes against Washington, and this one was toward the very end of the first half. A bad penalty taken by Fletcher Cox, awarded Washington an additional down, with some time left in the half. On one of the ensuing plays, the Skins put the ball in the endzone on a carry by Matt Jones. All this resulting from a dumb, carless and stupid penalty.

The big one for me is a third down play against Dallas on Sunday Night football. The play call was a dinky screen to Darren Sproles, that resulted in a loss of yardage. Dallas goes down the field, ties the game then wins it in OT. If they just dialed up a pass over the middle or a run play for Ryan Mathews, they win the game. I chalk that up all on Doug Pederson, that game should have been Dallas’s second loss.

The two words to describe the Eagles this season? If you guessed “dumb mistakes” then you hit the nail on the head, or put that nail into the coffin marked “Eagles 2016”. So now we await a chance at mediocrity in 2017, or maybe a chance to fly to the Elite.